Neo-Nazi violence poses a threat to domestic security

We have already written about the threat posed by neo-fascist violence in Britain, but in today’s Independent Johann Hari has written this piece about why he believes that neo-Nazi violence is just as much as a threat as Jihadism.

Hari writes: “The campaign I am talking about is not being planned by jihadis or fringe Irish nationalists but by white “neo-Nazis” who want to murder Asians, black people, Jews and gays in the bizarre belief it will trigger a ‘race war’.” 

He believes that the recent case of Neil Lewington proves how the threat is just as serious as Al-Qaeda and that the police should be monitoring white communities just as much as Muslim ones.

Concluding, Hari says: “We need to prepare ourselves now: the next person to bomb Britain might not look like Mohammed Sidiq Khan – he might look like me.” 

Hari is perhaps over stating it a bit. Intelligence experts such as Europol believe, quite rightly, that the greatest threat to domestic security is Islamism. Last year, despite the fact that he UK doesn’t release a detailed break down of arrests, there were a total of 187 Islamists arrested compared to zero for ”far-right” groups through out the whole of Europe (see Europol report for 2009).

Moreover, Hari is assuming that all Muslims are non-white. But what about deep rooted Caucasian Muslim communities such as in Bosnia – where Osama Bin Laden launched a Jihad during the 1990s?  And what about converts such as Sulyman (Simon) Keeler? Having attended an Al-Muhajiroun rally in July, I noticed plenty of white converts among the crowds.

There is, however, a serious point that Hari misses, and which we highlighted a few months ago. Groups such as the BNP have the potential to act as a “conveyor belt” to violence. This does not mean that we believe the BNP are a terrorist organisation (in the same way Hizb-ut-Tahrir are not a terrorist group). But it does mean they provide disgruntled members of British society with an ideological framework that can give violent extremists the justification to carry acts of violence (just as HT has done with some of its radicalized followers).  

What do you think? Should the UK security services consider neo-Nazi violence as a serious threat?

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